California Salad & Flank Steak

This salad celebrates some of California's most popular foods: luscious avocados, chewy dried apricots, crunchy almonds, creamy goat cheese, and of course, beautiful baby greens!

When you buy dried organic apricots, you may be surprised to see that they're brown instead of bright orange. Organic apricots aren't treated with sulfur preservatives, so even though they're not so pretty, they taste great.

California Salad
Food To Live By
5-6 cups (about 4 ounces) Earthbound Farm Organic Mixed Baby Greens
1/4 cup whole tarragon leaves
About 1/4 cup Lemon Vinaigrette (or your favorite vinaigrette dressing)
1/4 cup sliced almonds, toasted
1/2 cup (2 ounces) crumbled mild semisoft goat cheese or feta cheese
1/2 ripe avocado, preferably Hass
8 dried apricots, each cut into 3-4 strips

Just before you plan to serve the salad, place the greens and the tarragon in a large salad bowl and toss to combine. Add 3 tablespoons of the vinaigrette. Toss to lightly coat the leaves, then taste to see if more dressing is needed.

Transfer the greens to a platter or individual salad plates. Scatter the almonds and cheese on top of the greens.

Peel the avocado and discard the pit. Cut the avocado lengthwise into thin slices. Arrange the slices around the edge of the platter or plates. Sprinkle the apricots over the salad. Serve immediately.

Myra describes the different leaves in our Mixed Baby Greens (Spring Mix) and creates a delicious salad with a variety of tastes and textures based on her California Salad recipe — it’s easy to make substitutions (for example, Myra used dried cranberries instead of dried apricots) to suit your taste or use ingredients you have on hand.


Flank Steak with Lemon Sahllot Marinade
Serves 6 to 8
•3 pounds flank steak

•1 1/2 cups fresh Meyer lemon juice*

•1/2 cup soy sauce

•6 medium-size shallots, coarsely chopped

•2 tablespoons toasted sesame oil or peanut oil (optional)

1.Pierce both sides of the flank steak all over with a fork. Place the meat in a 1 gallon resealable plastic bag.

2.Pour the lemon juice in a small bowl and whisk in the soy sauce. Add the shallots and whisk in the sesame oil, if using. Pour about 2/3 cup of the marinade into a covered microwave-safe container and refrigerate it until it's time to use as a sauce.

3.Pour the remaining marinade into the bag with the flank steak and seal it, pressing out any excess air. Refrigerate the steak overnight, or up to 24 hours, turning the bag once or twice to distribute the marinade evenly.

4.When ready to cook, set up a barbecue grill and preheat it to high or preheat the broiler.

5.Remove the flank steak from the marinade. Grill or broil the steak about 3 inches from the heat source, until cooked to taste, 3 to 4 minutes per side for rare, or 4 to 6 minutes per side for medium-rare. When done, an instant-read meat thermometer inserted at an angle into the center of the steak will register 125 degrees F for rare or 135 degrees F for medium-rare.

6.Let the flank steak rest for about 5 minutes.

7.Meanwhile, warm the reserved 2/3 cup of marinade in the microwave and place it in a serving bowl. Cut the steak against the grain into very thin slices, holding the knife almost parallel to the surface of the steak and slicing it at a shallow angle. Serve the flank steak with the warm or room temperature marinade on the side for spooning over the steak.

*Or substitute 1 1/4 cups fresh lemon juice and 1/4 cup of fresh orange juice. Alternately, add 1 tablespoon sugar to 1 1/2 cups lemon juice.